Archive/File: people/e/eichmann.adolf/transcripts/Sessions/Session-077-01
Last-Modified: 1999/06/08
Session No. 77
8 Tammuz 5721 (22 June 1961)
Presiding Judge: I declare the seventy-seventh Session of
the trial open. I wish to announce that the corrections of
the Kappler questionnaire were dispatched today by this
Court.
The Accused will continue with his testimony. [To the
Accused] I remind you that you are still testifying under
oath.
Accused: Yes, Your Honour.
Presiding Judge: Please continue, Dr. Servatius.
Dr. Servatius: Your Honour, I shall continue to refer to
documents and, in the course of the examination, I shall ask
the Accused some questions.
The first exhibit is T/211, document 1401. It is an enquiry
addressed to the Accused by the Inspector of the Security
Police and the Security Service, of 27 February 1940 from
Posen, regarding the travel expenses of people to be
evacuated.
Witness, what were the financial arrangements for these
transports with regard to the money these people received?
Did you have anything to do with that here in Posen?
Accused: Neither I, nor the Security Police, had anything
to do with this matter, for these financial matters were
under the jurisdiction of the Main Trust Office East.
Dr. Servatius: The next exhibit, T/359, is document No.
1402. It is a letter concerning transport questions, dated
10 February 1940.
Witness, you are mentioned in this letter; it says that you
were staying in Posen. What did you have to do with the
local transport arrangements?
Accused: Whenever I was ordered to go to the East in
connection with evacuation matters, it was always concerned
with difficulties with the timetable. On the one hand, one
had to overcome the problems with the local administration
of the State railways and, on the other - and, as far as I
remember, that was the most important part at the time - to
avoid so-called evacuation peaks. The local authorities
tried to get action as soon as possible, while the receiving
authorities in the Generalgouvernement had, of course, to
cope with these evacuation transports train by train. One
of the tasks of my Section, under orders, was to direct
this.
Presiding Judge: Did I hear the word "Evakuierungsspitzen"
(evacuation peaks)? What does this term mean, Accused?
Accused: Yes, Your Honour. This word referred, at the
time, to a temporary accumulation of several transports,
instead of an even flow.
Dr. Servatius: The next exhibit is T/1406, document No.
1485. It is an official note about a telephone call from
Eichmann. The document deals with the provisioning of the
transports.
I have a question to the Accused: what did you have to do
with the provisioning of the transport?
Accused: The local authorities had the duty to see to it
that, initially, food for two days was provided to the
transport. Practice evidently showed that these two days
were too short a time. The Generalgouvernement called the
Head Office for Reich Security, or else informed the Head
Office for Reich Security, that in future all transports
would be sent back, that their reception would be refused,
if the evacuees had not received food for eight days.
Therefore, it was decided that food rations for eight days
were to be supplied, and this is what I announced. I could
not, of course, make such a decision on my own, but obtained
the authorization from my superiors. This had to do with
the transports, insofar as stoppages and inconveniences
would have been caused if the Generalgouvernement had
refused to accept them.
Judge Halevi: Who were your superiors whose approval you
obtained?
Accused: My superiors were then the Chief of Department
IV as my direct superior, SS Major General and General of
Police Heinrich Mueller, whose superior, and consequently my
superior at the second level, was the Chief of the Security
Police, SS Lieutenant General and General of the Police and
the Waffen-SS Heydrich, and afterwards Kaltenbrunner. And
then, at the third level, the Reichsfuehrer-SS and Chief of
the German Police.
Judge Halevi: But, in the matter of provisions for eight
days, you obtained authorization from your superiors. To
whom did you apply for instructions, for authorization to
provide food for eight days?
Accused: I had to obtain instructions from my direct
superior, that was Mueller, so that the guidelines could be
issued. Both he and I then had meetings with the local
holders of authority, as food was rationed at the time, and
such negotiations had, therefore, to be conducted.
Dr. Servatius: The next exhibit is T/383, document No. 935.
It is a cable from Goering dated 23 March 1940 to several
senior departments, and it relates to the prohibition of
transports of Jews from the Reich to the
Generalgouvernement.
Witness, what do you know about these events?
Accused: This intervention of the Governor General with
Goering and Goering's subsequent order are connected with a
document, of which I would say that the Governor General,
from the very beginning, refused to accept Jews from the
Reich in his territory. The Chief of the Security Police
had, however, at Himmler's order, ordered the deportation of
one thousand Jews from Stettin, and following this, local
authorities, as was shown by the example of Schneidemuehl,
evacuated smaller contingents at their own responsibility.
This experiment of Schneidemuehl may have been the reason -
as far as I now remember - for Frank's intervention with
Goering, which thus led to this order and, during the
following period, the District Party Leaders of the Reich
tried to intervene with Hitler, in order to annul this
prohibition, which they, indeed, managed to do in the course
of 1941 and of 1942, in particular.
Dr. Servatius: I now come to document No. 934 - which has
as yet no T number.
Presiding Judge: It will be marked N/10.
Dr. Servatius: This is a note from the Foreign Ministry of
3 June 1940, by Rademacher - with the title: Brief review of
the new, urgent tasks to be taken up by Section D3 (of
Department Germany III). These urgent tasks are enumerated
as follows: 1. A request for determination, in principle, by
the Minister for Foreign Affairs, of the German war aims
regarding the Jewish question. Possibilities: Item (a) All
Jews taken out from Europe. (b) Separation of eastern and
western Jews; eastern Jews, who constitute the procreative,
Talmud-trained generation of the Jewish intelligentsia,
remain in German hands as a pledge (Lublin?) to cripple the
American Jews; western Jews out from Europe (Madagascar?)
(c) Jewish National Home Palestine (danger of a second
Rome). I skip point 2. 3. Summary of the practical
details; number of Jews in each country, the funds and means
of transport required for the evacuation, and the possible
deadlines, etc.
There is a handwritten remark in the margin which, as far as
I understand it, says: "Following notification drawn up for
the Reich Minister for Foreign Affairs" - I am not entirely
sure that it says this - "the Reich Minister for Foreign
Affairs has, in principle, approved preparations for the
expulsion of the Jews from Europe."
It continues: "All actions must be taken with the consent of
the departments of the Reichsfuehrer-SS."
Witness, did Legation Councillor Rademacher, or any other
department of the Foreign Office, contact you on this
matter?
Accused: No, neither Legation Councillor Rademacher, nor
any other department, contacted me in this matter. It was an
entirely internal affair of the Foreign Office. But at that
time - the date was June 1940 - I was very busy with the so-
called "Madagascar Plan" and, as far as I can remember, and
having read this document, I cannot avoid the impression
that, at that time, the Foreign Ministry wanted to do, and
was trying to do, everything possible to prevent that the
leading role in solving the Jewish Question be left entirely
in the hands of the Security Police. The Foreign Ministry,
here, too, was in the running with full force, insofar as
foreign countries were concerned. I would, furthermore,
like to establish that, in reading this document, I was
struck in particular by two words, namely the word
zeugungskraeftig (procreative) and Faustpfand (pledge).
These - and especially the former word - have been imputed
to me, as I have often read after 1945. And here I find the
words already in 1940.
Dr. Servatius: I wish to refer now to exhibit T/173 -
document 464. This is a letter from Heydrich to Ribbentrop,
dated 24 June 1940. It deals with the solution of the
Jewish Question and states, in conclusion, in the second to
last paragraph: "The entire problem already concerns three
and a quarter million Jews in the area presently subject to
German sovereignty, but can no longer be solved through
emigration. A territorial final solution is, therefore,
needed."
The last three lines then read as follows: "I should like to
request to participate in the forthcoming discussions
concerning the Final Solution of the Jewish Question, should
such talks be planned." Signed: Heydrich.
Witness, could you state what kind of discussion is meant
here which is to take place in the Foreign Ministry?
Accused: Twenty-one years have gone by since this letter
was written. I myself never took part in any discussion in
the Foreign Ministry, whether in Rademacher's office or in
Luther's office, nor in any other department. I do not know
whether the Foreign Ministry did, at that time, initiate a
discussion on this matter. I think that Heydrich, in his
ambitiousness, in his fear that someone might deprive him of
the newly-conceived Madagascar Plan, which I have just
mentioned, and place it under his own control, and because
the Reich Minister for Foreign Affairs saw this primarily as
a foreign policy problem and claimed a controlling position,
and thus manifestations of rivalry come about, in this
connection.
Judge Raveh: Perhaps Dr. Servatius might wish to ask the
Accused what he understands by the words "Territorial Final
Solution."
Dr. Servatius: You have heard the question of the Judge.
Could you comment on this?
Accused: Yes, Sir. At that time, the Madagascar affair
came up for the first time, and I myself have already said
that I had been impressed and influenced by the book The
Jewish State by Boehm, and the problem which actually was an
old one, and which it brought up again. Shortly, the file
on Madagascar will be presented, and, at that time, I would
like to comment in detail on the substantive aspect. This
letter, then, refers to the island of Madagascar as a
territorial final solution.
Judge Halevi: Perhaps one more question through Dr.
Servatius. Why does the letterhead carry the notation IVD4?
Dr. Servatius: The Judge has asked one further question,
namely why does the file carry the number IVD4 which was, at
that time, on 24 June 1940, the file number of your Section?
Accused: Yes, Sir. On 24 June 1940, according to the
office work plan, that file number referred to my Section.
There were several ways in which a message could carry the
file number IVD4, in accordance with the office structure,
and bear the signature of Heydrich. It could happen, for
instance, that his adjutant could call my office and
transmit an order by his superior, Heydrich, or
Kaltenbrunner - that this or that should be done in such a
manner. For instance, a draft of a letter to this or that
person. Key words would be provided, and then the letter
would have to be drafted. Through regular channels, this
went all the way up to the chief who had given the
instruction; down through my office-superior - this was the
rule - the corrected version came back, until at last the
final draft was ready, and he signed it. Secondly, the
possibility existed that Heydrich - especially Heydrich -
also in the case of Kaltenbrunner, but not so frequently as
with Heydrich, who may have heard indications of something,
or may have gathered something at some other inter-
ministerial discussion which he then intended to work out,
in his turn. He then transmitted it through the Chief of
Department IV, and the Chief of Department IV subsequently -
if this was within my competence - passed it on to me, that
is to say, to my Section, with the same instruction: to
draft a letter.
At times - although rarely - it also happened that the Chief
of Department IV - my immediate superior, that is to say,
Mueller - ordered me to report immediately, or at such and
such a time to the Chief of the Security Police to receive
orders in this or that matter. In such cases, letters of
this kind would be drafted and the number of the file would,
of course, be IVD4, but the originator of the order was
Heydrich or Mueller, because, in matters of principle, not
only was I unable to make any decision, but because first of
all, since I had been transferred from my original post, in
1939, against my will, to the State Police Department in
Berlin, I did not make any use of the minor power of giving
directives which, as a matter of fact, is granted to every
head of section. Instead, I referred every proceeding, be
it important or unimportant, to my immediate superior, with
the request for instructions or orders. I was known for
that, not only in my Section, but in the entire Department.
Judge Halevi: Thank you.
Accused: May I correct something, please. Instead of the
expression "minor power of giving directives," it should, of
course, be "the minor power of implementation," because the
section heads had the right to implement policy, but not to
issue directives.
Dr. Servatius: I refer now to exhibits T/675, that is
document No. 894, and T/674, that is document No. 893. Both
of these documents belong together. They refer to the
transport of Jews from Baden and the Palatinate to southern
France.
The first is a letter dated 31 October 1940, a note from
Rademacher in the Foreign Ministry. It states: "At the
orders of the Fuehrer, all Jews of the districts (Gaue) of
Baden and the Palatinate are to be removed in eight special
trains to the unoccupied part of France." It then goes on
to state: "The Regional Headquarters of the State Police at
Karlsruhe, Neustadt a.d.H., and Saarbruecken had orders from
the Reichsfuehrer-SS to prepare and carry out this operation
in all secrecy." It further states that the official in
charge at the Foreign Ministry had spoken with SS
Hauptsturmbannfuehrer Guenther. It says that it had been
considered whether to inform the French Government, but this
was not done.
The second letter which pertains to this...
Attorney General: There must be an error here on the part of
Counsel for the Defence. The letter was not written by
Rademacher, but by somebody else, although it originated
apparently at the Foreign Ministry.
Presiding Judge: Is that so clear? I, too, tried to
decipher that. It could be Rademacher.
Attorney General: The signature which we have ends with
"Schefer" or "hefer," but certainly not "macher." While
this is not too important, I would still like to emphasize
it, for the sake of precision.

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